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May 31, 2012

I don't know if I have ever completely made a quilt in 1 month but I know I have never completely made 2 quilts in a month. Of course, they aren't anything special from a design/construction/quilting standpoint but I really like them a lot and they are going to be great sofa quilts for Christmas.

Grinch 2

50 x 63

There was no plan for these. I started by estimating the finished size of the quilt and from that decided on a block size of 10 x 13. Next I framed the panel blocks out to 10.5 x 13.5 and then started making the other blocks to fill in. I got both tops made in about a day and a half.

Both are backed in flannel. I created the backing by sewing 3 lengths of flannel fabric and I was able to load one long backing piece and quilt the both to it. That stripe fabric was the middle section so there's some of it on both quilts. The quilting is very simple. I did the fern meander on one and a ribbon meander on the other. I actually had to order another yard of fabric for the binding and, of course, it's all machine stitched too. There isn't a hand stitch in the whole thing!

I was going to keep one and give the other away. I may still do that but I also might keep both since we both need TV quilts.....we'll see. I have a few months to decide.

May 27, 2012

Wow, what a busy weekend this has been! Mom has quilted 3 quilts on Willie and I've done lots of garden maintenance, lots of chores and bound 2 small quilts. Then I needed a rest and decided to sit down and play with EQ. I recently bought Volume 5 of Quiltmaker's 100 Blocks.

There are a lot of cool blocks in it and I decided to start with Four Gables by Susan Knapp and Mary Jane Mattingly.

All of these designs use the Monarch Fabric Palette, of course! Click on the link if you are interested in ordering any of the Monarch palette fabrics.

The first design is a straight set with 4" border blocks made from bits of the main block.

The second layout is on point with partial blocks for the side and corner triangles.

May 26, 2012

If you live in the US I hope you are having a wonderful Memorial Day weekend. Coincidentally I am readign a story about life in post-WWII Russia and it makes me even more grateful for those who serve to protect our freedoms.

While Mom is here quilting I enjoyed a morning in my garden and even enjoyed being outside and clean the back porch furniture. The spiders sure do take over quickly but I should be able to enjoy some iced tea in the rockers for a couple of days before they move back in.

Today I want to share my May color palette project. I finished it last night.

Earlier this week I saw a link to this tutorial. It's a combo pin cushion and caddy. I love pincushions and thought I needed one of these.

Made in the challenge palette and hand dyed fabric it looks like a giant blossom and I love it! I thought it would be great for my armchair sewing caddy since it will hold scissors and thread. But it turned out bigger than I expected.

It's nice and deep so I decided that it could reside in the middle of my cutting table and hold my rotary cutters. I like it a lot and the tutorial is really well written and illustrated so give it a try!

May 24, 2012

I'm sorry about the lack of posting yesterday. That book review was supposed to post yesterday but I have been calendar deficient lately and scheduled it for today instead.

Oh well.

I didn't notice it yesterday because Estelle and I were in the basement all day for one of our TED (technique exploration) days. Yes, we did monoprinting last month but I enjoyed it so much that I wanted to do it again and make more bases for postcards.

Monoprinting, as we did it, is printed on a glass surface. I have some old window sashes that I use. They are big and give me a huge area for a work surface which makes cleaning up a breeze. I intended to take some process photos but completely forgot. I promise to do it in the future but the basic process is to paint on the glass, create some texture in the paint, possibly add a mask and then lay the fabric face down on the paint to get the print. I use a brayer to roll the fabric to the glass surface

Now these are the starts of postcards. They will get lots of stitching and embellishment to spice them up. I used hand dyed fabric for the backgrounds on all of them. The stars were printed twice. I printed the red waves first and then printed the light blue. I got the stripes by scraping the edge of corrugated cardboard through the paint. I free form cut stars for the masked shape.

The hearts were done by laying down the pink paint and stamping in it to remove some paint. Then I used hearts cut from paper for the mask. I used the same process for the group of trees that will become a Christmas postcard.

The flower was done by using a foam stamp to remove some of the paint.

My Mom is coming for the weekend to play with Willie (my APQS Millennium) so I rushed to get the 2 Grinch quilts quilted this week so that Willie would be free. These are TV snuggle quilts so they got very quick treatments. I did one in an overall fern print and the other in a ribbon meander. I got both done in about 4 total hours.

Last night I participated in an adult spelling bee to benefit the READ Center. The READ Center offers adult literacy classes and tutoring in the Richmond, VA area. It's a great organization that operates on a shoestring budget. My team did not win (as we expected) but we all now know how to spell "labyrinth". :)